ON TiHE ORIGIN, CONNEXION, &c. 



407 



to pluck away attribute after attribute from the diadem of the Deity, out 

 of mere compliment to the demand of a fanciful and empty hypothesis. I 

 retreat from this subject, however, with pleasure. It is too perplexed and 

 mysterious for popular discussion, and I am fearful of darkening- it by illus- 

 tration. I should not have touched upon it, but that I have been forced, by 

 the regular progress of our own inquiries ; and now turn, with a free and un- 

 fettered foot, to the study of the passions ; their general nature and influence 

 upon human actions and language ; which we shall enter upon in our next 

 lecture. 



LECTURE IX. 



ON THE ORIGIN, CONNEXION, AND CHARACTER OF THE PASSIONS. 



We have entered upon an inquiry concerning the nature and operation of 

 the various faculties that constitute the general furniture of the mind 

 These we have divided into three classes; the faculties of the understanding, 

 the faculties of volition, and the passions or faculties of emotion. The com- 

 mencement of the present series of lectures was devoted to an illustration of 

 the first ; the second we discussed in our preceding study ; and we now 

 advance to a brief analysis of the third. 



In sailing over the sea of life, the passions are the gales that swell the 

 canvass of the mental bark ; they obstruct or accelerate its course ; and 

 render the voyage favourable or full of danger, in proportion as they blow 

 steadily from a proper point, or are adverse and tempestuous. Like the wind 

 itself, they are an engine of high importance and mighty power. Without 

 them we cannot proceed ; but with them we may be shipwrecked and lost. 

 Reined in, therefore, and attempered, they constitute, as I have already 

 observed, our happiness; but let loose and at random, they distract and 

 ruin us. 



How few, beneath auspicious planet born, 

 With swelling sails make good the promis'd port, 

 With all their wishes freighted. Young. 



Let it not be forgotten, however, that the passions are not distinct agents, 

 but mere affections or emotions, mere states or conditions of the mind, ex- 

 cited by an almost infinite variet}^ of external objects and events, or internal 

 operations and feelings. And here, the first remark that will probably occur 

 to us is, that, derived from sources thus numerous and diversified, they must 

 themselves form a numerous and motley host. Some of them are simple, 

 others complex; some peculiar to certain circumstances or individuals, others 

 general and embracing all countries and conditions ; some possessing a 

 natural tendency to promote what is good ; and others what is mischievous 

 and evil; while many of them, again, though distinguished by separate 

 names, only differ from other passions in degree ; and, hence, naturally merge 

 into them upon a change in the scale- 

 It has often occurred to me, that if we were to follow up all the passions, 

 multiplied and complicated as they are, to their radical sources, and to draw 

 out their respective genealogies, we might easily reduce them to four— Desire, 

 Aversion, Joy, and Sorrow. And as aversion and sorrow are only the oppo 

 sites of desire and joy, and must necessarily flow from their existence in a 

 state of things in which all we meet with is not to be desired or enjoyed, it 

 is possible that desire and-joy ought alone to be regarded as the proper parent 

 stocks of all the rest. Let us examine them for a few minutes under this 

 system of simplification. 



